The Barnetts: Two posts back to back! With back being the key word.

That title is a total lie. On my last post when I said, "until tomorrow", I obviously meant a week from now.

Really, I hesitated to share this story because I don't want to create any envy and bitterness over the "fabulousness" that is our life.

To fully appreciate this post, you need a little history into the bad luck plague of 2012. James and I decided to start investing our resources (both time and money) into a lower income area of town where we believe God is really moving. We had prayed about this decision for quite awhile and pressed forward in January. As soon as we made this decision, things started to fall apart... literally.

When we got married, I moved into James' house and we rented out my house. Now we own two homes and it appears they got together and decided that the first part of 2012 would be a good time to fall apart. It started in January with sewer problems in the rental house. It was a $40 drain issue that snowballed into, "I'm sorry Mrs. Barnett, we have to cut a large hole into the driveway to get to a pipe near the street.” Needless to say, not cheap!

In keeping with the rental house repairs, we had to get a dead pine tree cut down and the back windows replaced. None of that was cheap!

Then our house joined in on the fun. The freezer went out, the ice maker went out, the dryer went out, two of the burners on our gas stove top quit working and our computer died. All of the repairs in and of themselves weren't crazy expensive, but add them all together and it was not cheap!!

Then other things decided to join in on the fun. James' car needed four new tires, mine needed new brakes, Uncle Sam decided to rob us and the State of Alabama is holding our state refund hostage. I told James that I wanted to start flushing hundred dollar bills down the drain since that would be a quicker and less painful way to empty out our savings account.

The final straw was when I lost my best pair of maternity pants. I changed to go to the gym and must have dropped them out of my gym bag. This loss caused a full blown melt down, complete with a really ugly cry and a bloody nose. Y'all...those pants weren't cheap!!

If I had known how 2012 would start out, I think I would have stayed curled up in the fetal position and waited patiently for 2013.

Honestly, if this wasn't happening to me, I wouldn't believe it. Through all of this it became very clear. I don't love money, but I do love the security that it offers. I've always felt like if our bank accounts had a certain balance, we would be okay. I'm learning, the hard way, to run to God when times get hard.

All of that leads me to another major reason The Barnett's have been off the grid. James was awarded a trip to the Bahamas for a job well done at work. We thought of this trip as an all expense paid Babymoon (with 400 of our closest co-workers and their spouses).

The trip started out like this:

We snorkeled, swam with the dolphins, rode the lazy river 852 times, ate amazing seafood and rested. Life was good. Then Friday night around 10:30, James made the fatal error of bending down to untie his shoes.

The trip ended like this:

Oh yes ma'am...that's a Bahamian ambulance. James' back went out again. Apparently two of his discs insisted on re-herniating (I'm sure that's a medical term). Fortunately the last time this happened, we were in the good old US of A where insurance will cover most anything.

Here we were in a foreign country heading to the ER while the rest of our fellow travelers are about to board a chartered flight back to the states. Awesome!

Here are a couple of things I learned:

The Bahamas is amazing inside Atlantis. As soon as you leave the resort, it's a third world country.
There are two hospitals in the Bahamas, one is public and one is private. We were told that everybody goes to the private hospital especially the doctors. Which is why it is called Doctor's Hospital.

As soon as we arrived to the ER, James was taken to a makeshift room and I was escorted away to register him. It was there that I discovered a few key facts. Doctor's Hospital (1) does not take insurance (2) needed $1,500 for a deposit before they would even look at James and (3) resembled a free clinic in Harlem. (Not that I've ever been to a free clinic in Harlem, but it's how I picture one to look.)

Shortly after entering the dark, scary world of no insurance, I settled into James' "room" to see what $1,500 would get us. Apparently that plus another $2,500 buys you a six hour ER stay, an EKG, 2 IV bags of fluid, an MRI and a prescription of muscle relaxers and pain killers. Oh...and the ability to borrower a sweet sweet hospital gown.

The MRI was for the obvious. Unfortunately none of the doctors could read it. The EKG was because his heart rate was 34 (too low in their opinion). The IV (with a little pain medicine and a lot of sodium) was because his blood pressure dropped to 74/30 as soon as we arrived. (Mine was probably 300/180, but nobody was concerned about that.)

Finally after 6 hours, they found a doctor that could read the MRI. James had two herniated discs (L4 and L5) that were sitting on the nerve sack and an annular tear in his S1. PAINFUL! Here's my conversation with the doctor:

Doc: Blah, Blah, Blah MRI results.

Me: Thank you. Can you give him enough pain meds so I can get us back to the United States? (At this point I didn't care which state as long as it was in the United States.)

Doc: I can give him some pain meds, but I really think we need to keep him overnight for observation. His blood pressure dropping that low concerns me.

Me: Well it's been stable for the last five hours. (Plus I'll probably have to mortgage our house to pay for a night in this hospital).

Doc: It's your decision, but you'll have to sign a refusal of medical services.

Me: Where do I sign? (Probably not one of my finer wife moments.)

Truthfully, we can laugh about it now (4 weeks later). Here's are a few bits of humor in a really dark time:

When the EMT's came to pick James up in our hotel room they asked if he had any allergies. He replied, "Yes, pollen and mold." Ha! I'm not sure “seasonal allergies” is what they were referring to!
James' legs were too long for the ambulance and the same EMT's ask him to bend his legs so they could shut the back doors. Um...you do realize that you are here because he can't walk, much less bend his legs to accommodate your really small ambulance?
When the guys first got to our hotel room, they stabilized James' neck and strapped him on a back board. First James HATES things around his neck and second, the back board bent when they struggled to lift him up to put him in the gurney. Further proof that men who are 6'4 and weigh 210 are uncommon in this country.
I sat in a card table chair while various medical personnel came to poke and prod on James. Since the "walls" were simply shower curtains, I was able to hear other patients discuss their various issues with the doctors. The lady next to James sounded like she had just had a stroke. Her blood pressure was super high and the doctor asked if she was a smoker. She said, “No…not really. I smoke 7 to 10 cigarettes a day.” When the doctor asked how long, she said, “For the last 45 years!” He then asked her about her alcohol habits. Unfortunately a nurse came into our room while she was answering, so I didn’t get to hear her response.
The man next to us was apparently in the middle of a heart attack. I realized real quick that we needed to settle in for awhile. A few herniated discs on a man in his mid-thirties were the least of the doctor’s problems.
When we found out that we could go home, we could only get a return flight back to Atlanta. James' parents were gracious enough to take the day off of work and come pick us up. When we got off the plane, I wheeled James to baggage claim. On our way, we passed a large group of people waiting for their loved ones. There were our loved ones, holding a sign that said, "Welcome Home James, Anne-Michelle and Baby Hayes!" I don’t know why, but this made me laugh and then I got a bloody nose.
We went to the doctor as soon as we got home and the good news is that he'll survive and the even better news is that I'll get to keep putting his socks and shoes on him for at least two more weeks.

Here we are back at home: